


Whosoever Holds This Frying Pan

by tolarian



Series: Trefoil [3]
Category: Captain America (Movies), The Avengers (Marvel Movies), The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types, Thor (Movies)
Genre: Alcohol, Fluff and Angst, Gen or Pre-Slash, Grief/Mourning, Grilled Cheese, Guilt, Long Live Feedback Comment Project, Multi, Pre-Slash, Thor (Marvel) is Not Stupid, Trauma, but he is very hungover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-11-24
Updated: 2018-11-24
Packaged: 2019-08-28 09:29:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,169
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16720770
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tolarian/pseuds/tolarian
Summary: Steve apologizes to Thor and ends up channeling his inner Julia Child. That last part would be easier if he knew who that was.Written in the Trefoil 'verse.





	Whosoever Holds This Frying Pan

**Author's Note:**

> Kind of a character study and prequel to Cap in Hand and Trefoil: Steve refers to this incident in Chapter Thirteen of Trefoil, but it can be read separately. This occurs early in Steve and Thor's friendship / eventual relationship, taking place after Thor's return from taking Loki to Asgard. In this continuity, Thor returned to the Avengers much more quickly than in canon.
> 
> It's worth noting that Steve is still in mourning for Bucky and Thor loves Jane but also has some concerns about the viability of their relationship. 
> 
> Thank-you very much for reading! Content Notes at the end. Steve packs in a lot of trauma here: it's still pretty early in his adjustment to the future.
> 
> Unbeta'ed, so all errors are my own.

Steve knocked on Thor’s door before he could lose his nerve. When the door opened, Thor looked at him, confused and grandly hungover. He was in civilian clothes, wearing Stark-branded pajama pants and a white t-shirt. His hair was almost entirely free from its ponytail: there must have been just a little bit tied in the back as the rest fell to his shoulders. There was a little strand of gold caught in his mouth as he looked muzzily at Steve. 

Steve had a dim memory of Natasha braiding Thor’s hair the night before. And Clint unbraiding it. They’d waged silent warfare over control of Thor’s hair until Tony had insisted his own hair was long enough to put in barrettes and was suffering from a lack of attention. 

Tony had been proven at least partially correct.  When Steve had woken up in bed without remembering much beyond Clint carefully sectioning Tony’s hair, he had been relieved he wasn’t sporting tiny pigtails like one of Bucky’s sisters. And then he had remembered how he’d gotten to bed and the feeling of relief had evaporated.  

Thor smelled incongruously like smoke. And was that  _cheese_? He smelled like a delicatessen that had burned down. 

“Captain,” Thor rumbled after a long pause. Maybe he’d thought Steve smelled funny, too. Still friendlier than most folks were awake, though. He wiped his face blearily. “May I help you?” 

Steve was still trying to figure out the smell. “If it’s too early, I can—” 

“No, no,” Thor yawned hugely, waving him inside the doorway. “Please, join me. “ 

As Steve followed him, the smell of charring and cheese intensified. Jesus, what had Thor and the others gotten up to while Steve snored? Why hadn’t JARVIS turned on the sprinklers? This seemed like a safety violation. 

“Thor—” he began, following him into the kitchen. Steve stared. 

“I was attempting to recreate the ‘grilled cheese’ Barton showed me last night,” Thor responded, looking sheepish. “I have burned a great deal of bread.” 

Steve blinked, looking at the wreck of the kitchen: soot on the wall, shards of charred bread and crisped bits of cheese on the counter. Most of a toaster: had Thor put the fire out by smashing it?  

Suddenly, Steve remembered Clint making a passionate speech about “the perfect food” the night before. Thor must have been too drunk to remember that Clint had used a frying pan.  _Steve_ remembered that and he’d blacked out some time after the singing started.

Maybe Thor hadn’t actually dried out enough to qualify as hungover yet?  

Mjölnir lay on the counter, with some cheese drying on the haft. 

“You want help?” Steve asked. 

Thor beamed. And that was how Steve found himself buttering bread and making eight grilled cheese sandwiches, two at a time in the pan, then coaching Thor through the final four. Of the total, Steve ate four and a half, directing the slight majority of them to Thor, who ate like he’d carried Steve up every stair in the Tower. Granted, thatwas how he always ate. Thor drank beer with his sandwiches and Steve drank tap water.  

Their conversation took place standing by the stove and thankfully, mostly focused on the melting points of different cheeses—Asgard favored goat cheeses, he learned—and the gastronomical limitations of the pop-up toaster. Of the final quartet of sandwiches, only the first two of which were significantly burnt, due to both Steve and Thor becoming absorbed in a story about Thor’s pet goats.

Thor looked at the last sandwich, presented like a monument to Asgardian interest in other cultures on the kitchen table, and he said, “Presumably, Captain, you did not visit me to discuss cheese.” 

“No,” Steve admitted. He’d practiced this speech in his bathroom: what had he decided to say? “Actually, I wanted to apologize.” 

Thor looked at him, confused. He scratched his beard, the scrape of his blunt nails making a sound like sandpaper, like a match being struck slowly. “For what possible reason could you need to apologize?” 

The blush was starting in Steve’s chest, just getting warmed up before its slow, hideous journey up his neck and shoulders. “You carried me to bed last night, right?” 

“Oh yes,” Thor said, nodding brightly. “The Widow informed me that you would be embarrassed to wake up on the floor.” 

The floor. Oh, Jesus. “She was right,” Steve agreed. “And thank-you for that: no-one else could have done it unless Tony got the suit.” Not that he would have wanted Tony anywhere near the suit last night. It would have been best if they’d dragged him into the elevator on a blanket or just left him where he was. On the floor. “But I, uh, I think I said something to you and if I did, I need to apologize,” Steve said. The blush rose past the base of his throat: a drunk parade up 5th Avenue, packed full of stumbling Irish. 

Thor’s brow furrowed as he tried to recall a very long night. Steve felt a spark of hope: if Thor didn’t remember that the frying pan was an essential tool for making grilled cheese, maybe he’d forgotten what Steve had said. If he’d said it at all.  

The spark sputtered as Thor looked suddenly like he knew the answer to a trivia question. Thor did not typically excel at trivia, Steve had heard. Well, overheard, really. Clint had been narrating an attempt at trivia night for Natasha while piloting the Quinjet the previous week.  “Ah, you did speak, briefly, but there is no need to discuss if it pains you.” Thor looked at Steve with uncharacteristic gravity. “As it appears it does.” 

“Did I do anything else Natasha thought I would be embarrassed by?” Steve asked. Best to confirm he was only apologizing for the  _one_ thing before this turned into a Human Resources situation. The folks at SHIELD Human Resources were very nice and  _very_ informative, but they looked at Steve like he was a grenade without a pin, rolling toward their feet. 

“No,” Thor announced: he took a large bite out of the grilled cheese. It must have been cold by now, but he seemed perfectly pleased with it. “You were quite subdued during our festivities. Are you well, Captain? I understand that Midgardian alcohol no longer affects you.” 

Steve nodded, paying closer attention to the answer than the following question. At least there was that. He hadn’t done anything to the team, aside from show them that he snored. On the floor.  

They were still figuring each other out: all eccentric in their own way, all talented and troubled. He shouldn’t have had anything to drink, especially when he realized Thor wasn’t sharing the Asgardian alcohol with anyone but Steve. He’d picked up Clint one-handed when the archer had attempted to sneak some and that had been pretty early in the night.   

“I’m fine, I just want to explain what I said.” Steve exhaled slowly, like you were supposed to before coming up from a dive. “What I think I said, anyway. Pardon the question, but did I call you Bucky?” 

Thor nodded. “I was unsure if that was the name, but yes.” He finished the rest of the sandwich. He watched Steve as he chewed. Steve knew how easily folks mistook big and genial for stupid: he knew Thor was observant and thoughtful. It was just too bad he had to observe  _this_. 

“And I told you to put me down?” Steve hazarded. Now for the fun part, if his memory was correct. Which it almost certainly was, thank-you Dr. Erskine. 

“That I must, unless I was ‘planning on treating you like a dame in bed, too’.” Thor recited the words with a flat inflection, the way he always did words and phrases that meant nothing to him. Steve was pretty sure he’d been speaking pure Brooklyn at the time. It was part of why he’d kept quiet earlier that night: the team mostly knew the radio announcer voice and the last time he’d been soused, he hadn’t had any elocution lessons yet. Steve hadn't been sure what was going to come out of his mouth if he said anything.

...Bucky would have thought this was all just  _hilarious_. 

“I did not understand what you meant,” Thor added, which would have been a kindness if Steve didn’t have to explain. It wouldn’t be right to sloppily cozy up to a team-mate and count on cultural differences to keep him from realizing Steve had mistaken him for his best guy. If Steve hadn’t been so lazy with the drink, so annoyed to think Bucky had had to  _carry_ him, he would have rubbed up against him like a cat. Jesus. What a thought.  

“Luckily, you did not insist on being put down. You were not entirely awake, I think,” Thor finished. 

Steve hung his head, trying to plan how he would explain without making this worse.

Thor was very handsome, obviously, but everyone on the team was in their own way. They were all smart, and competent and had very symmetrical faces: he'd been reminded of that while doing some sketches. Even Tony, though Steve would rather bite through his shield than admit it.  _Much_ more importantly, however, they were all his team: the last time Steve had mixed a command with his personal affairs, Bucky had fallen into a goddamn mountain pass trying to protect him.  

And maybe Thor was trying to give him an out by pretending Allspeak didn’t translate drunk, horny Brooklynite. 

The blush was up to his cheeks, now. Steve imagined he was pretty pink by this point: at least it should be painfully obvious how sorry he was. Sorry to be having this conversation, sorry for cuddling up to his team-mate like he had no goddamn sense of responsibility. Like Bucky really had been gone for decades, rather than so recently that Steve could remember how the train car smelled like ozone and tar even before the shooting started.

Sure, Bucky would have thought it was hilarious, but Bucky was an unrepentant asshole and a dead one at that. 

Because of Steve. 

His stomach clenched and he realized he’d never responded to Thor’s report. Steve cleared his throat: he could go back to being miserable for slightly more established reasons after he’d apologized properly to the extremely foreign dignitary who lived three floors above him.

“Did you tell anyone what I said, ask what it meant?”  

“No,” Thor said with conviction. “You are a very private man: it would have been unseemly to repeat anything you said in an unguarded moment.”  

“Thank-you,” Steve said, somehow grateful and miserable all at once. Well, best get it over with. And with any luck, Thor would keep this to himself, too. No use being a sad-sack over it. 

“Uh,” he said. “I should explain. Hoo, boy. Bucky, uh, James Barnes, he was a friend of mine. My best friend. A soldier. Sergeant in the Army, sniper for the Commandos in the war.” Oh, Jesus. Did they talk about this in Asgard? None of the rest of the team  _knew_ , he was pretty sure. Tony joked about Bucky being “Sergeant Boyfriend”, but the details of the joke would have been so much more  _obscenely specific_  if he thought it was true.  

“We were more than that, though.” Steve struggled for the phrasing. What did they call it now? He’d sat through a seminar on this. He’d  _taken notes. A_ nd tried to keep a straight face while an intern explained the existence of same-sex relationships and gender identity to Captain America, like Steve Rogers hadn’t regularly gotten his ass kicked while being called a bunch of things people apparently weren’t supposed to say anymore. 

Thor’s expression was neutral, his voice carefully even.  _Christ, what a time for the guy to be hard to read._  “You were romantically involved?” 

Steve nodded, feeling like a goddamn idiot. The world might have spun forward while he was under, but Thor was from somewhere they used magic hammers as weapons, for God’s sake.  

“And you believed me to be him?” Was it Steve’s imagination that Thor looked sickened? Or was that just the seven and a half grilled cheeses after a night of drinking with more beer on top?  

“I’m sorry, I was so drunk, I—” Steve started, then he took a deep breath and tried again. “You remember, I used to be real little, sick all the time?”  

Thor nodded.  

“Bucky and I met when we were just kids. He was always bigger than me. When I realized someone was carrying me, I guess I thought it was...back then. I never  _liked_ it when Bucky had to take care of me: he had to, a lot, even after we...” He blew out a deep breath and looked down at Thor’s kitchen table. There was a smear of grease from his hand. “I’m sorry. You must think...” Steve trailed off, shaking his head. 

“No apology is needed,” Thor said, sounding sincere. He had more expression now, earnest and kind. He must have had time to recover. Had they sent him to seminars, too? He tried to imagine Thor taking notes while an intern explained all the acronym.

“Barton said you have no living acquaintances left. That includes this man?” 

“Yes,” Steve said, trying answer without forcing the word out, without spitting. “There are some folks left, I mean, just...well, not him. Not because of the time. Bucky, he, uh, he died a few weeks before the plane went down. During a mission.”

He wasn’t seeing it, he was seeing it. He closed his eyes and the air he breathed in, breathed out was cold. Frost in his lungs, spreading outward. 

“You remain in mourning,” Thor said. When Steve blinked, he saw the other man had leaned forward. The kindness in his eyes made Steve want to vault over the counter and smash straight through the door on his way out. He should have brought his shield. “From your perspective, very little time has passed since his death.” 

“Yeah,” Steve replied, feeling like he’d been swallowing rocks. He sat still for a moment, then stood up from his chair. The slower version of the vault. “Anyway, I should—” 

Thor reached out: his hand weighed down Steve’s arm. Warm. Warm like Steve was supposed to be. “I have upset you,” he said. “Please, stay.” 

Steve sat, trying not to look like he was full-on panicking. He’d killed more Nazis than he’d had warm breakfasts. He’d been shot at by Peggy Carter. Why was this so goddamn nerve-wracking?  

“May I ask you some questions?” Thor’s hand was still on his arm. 

This was not a conversational direction Steve had anticipated. Maybe they  _hadn’t_ put Thor through any seminars. He nodded. 

“Jane and Darcy have led me to believe Midgardians are, for the most part, accepting of such relationships. Was this not the case in your time, Captain?” 

“Jesus, no,” Steve said, relieved the topic was a matter of public record. He still pulled his arm back. It wasn’t the first heavy hand he’d slipped out from underneath, even if was an  _absurdly_ kind one. “It was illegal,” he added, remembering the fear, the way it made the air heavy. 

“So, that is another thing that changed while you slept. The positive changes are far outweighed by what you have lost, I suspect.” 

Steve shrugged. “No, I mean. The world? Better. So much better. But...” He shook his head. Bucky long-dead, Peggy unwell, the Commandos scattered and mostly gone. 

“I am not upset at being mistaken for your lover,” Thor said bluntly. “He was a warrior, in addition to being your beloved. I respect any man who was your shield-brother. But I am sorry to have reminded you of your loss, Captain.” 

“Not something I forget,” Steve muttered. “Not your fault, either,” he added, louder. 

“Would you tell me more about him?” 

Steve blinked, sure he’d misheard. “What?”  

“You speak very little of your past. I assume Stark’s needling has not encouraged you. And grief feeds on silence.” 

Steve looked down into his hands, folded in his lap. Fingers still a little greasy from the butter. He tried to line up all those moments in his head, but they danced a reel. Bucky, a cocky kid; Bucky, the center of any dance floor. Could he explain about Peggy, about what all three of them had made together? He didn’t think Human Resources had  _that_ talk on the roster, though.  

Steve heard himself say: “He loved to dance. He saved my life more times than I can count. He got bit on the ass by a dog once.” 

“I would greatly enjoy knowing more about Sergeant Barnes,” Thor announced. 

Steve’s head snapped up: Thor had remembered Bucky’s name. 

“What,  _really?_ " Pure Brooklyn again. At least he wasn’t stewed this time.  

Yes,” Thor boomed. “More water, Captain?” 

“Thanks,” Steve said, trying not to gawp as Thor went to refill his glass. 

* * *

Thor shut the door after the Captain left. The conversation had ranged widely, which he had not anticipated. The Captain’s reminiscing had been something out of a skald’s tale: terrible privation, the chaos of war, the open wound of love found and lost.  

Thor himself had wept openly after hearing of the fate of the Captain’s mother and Barnes’ vow to a grieving son. At first, Thor had tried to remain calm—the Captain seemed so uncomfortable with his own emotions—but the obvious restraint exerted by the Captain had loosed his tears. So much loss borne in such a small amount of time: chronologically, the Captain was far younger than he assumed. 

For a moment, he had looked it, thanking Thor quietly for listening before excusing himself.  

Thor smiled at the instructions left on the table: detailed wisdom doled out in numbered steps for constructing the cheese sandwiches so favored by Barton. The Captain had written them out as they had spoken of Barnes. Small, comical sketches accompanying each step. One, beside a short list of actions to be avoided, featured a tiny Thor surrounded by black smoke, holding a flaming toaster that was setting his beard alight.   

The man was a talented artist, in addition to being a wise leader. Likely a staunch friend, if one took the time to know him.  

His stories about Barnes had suggested that the Captain had once been a very different man, though: passionate to the point of volatility, heedless, and stubborn. Bloody-knuckled and angry. Did those qualities remain beneath his stern exterior? Did they sleep like he had under the ice? 

Thor had known of the Captain’s displacement, though he had been incurious about it. A few decades seemed like so little time, but of course it would be a great period for a Midgardian, let alone one so young. The Captain’s grave kindness, his gentle avoidance of the merriment that Stark and Barton enjoyed so—and the Widow and Banner tolerated—made much more sense now. 

He had been—and remained—one of Midgard’s greatest heroes. And a beauty, surely, but beautiful like a memorial to the honored dead: meant to be admired from afar, not to be traced with bare hands.

Stark thought the Captain stiff. Barton thought of him as a strange curiosity, much like he did Thor.  _You’re a lot more chill, though,_  Barton had explained, and then had to explain further. The Widow’s true opinion was unknowable and Banner’s was only barely more accessible: he had gained his great curse while trying to recreate the Captain’s abilities, Stark had explained.  _I think_ _Capsicle_ _in all his upright perfection_ _makes things a little green_ _. K_ _now what I mean, Hammer Time_ _?_   

As a group, they appeared to admire the Captain for his deeds and accept his leadership, but none of them pursued his friendship beyond their initial bonding after their first great battle. And he did not offer, but instead kept himself busy. With Fury and Hill, Thor had supposed. How  _did_ the man spend his time? Did any of their company know? The Widow presumably did, but she kept that—and most—information to herself. 

The Captain spent precious little of his time in the Tower, having accepted a place there only after his other home had been destroyed. The building had been blasted by a phalanx of demons under the sway of a sorcerer. Their company had arrived to find the Captain guiding his neighbors out of the rubble while fending off the infernal interlopers. Once Stark and the Widow had taken over the rescue operations, the Captain had turned his full attention on the enemy. His wrath had been beautiful and he had removed himself to his floor after the battle was won.   

It had been a surprise when the Captain had accepted the invitation to celebrate Thor’s return to Midgard. He had accepted Thor’s mead, too, with a gentle smile, and clearly underestimated its potency. Perched on a chair off to the side, he had listened to the others joke rather than join in. Fading into the background as he could not on the field of battle. It had only been when Stark had said “So, Cap passed out. We’re going to draw on his face, right?”  that he had realized the Captain was asleep.  

When Thor had carried him to his bed—his visage unmarred by Stark’s mischief—he had been a pleasant enough armful. He had only squirmed the once, when he mistook Thor for his long—or was it recently?—lost love.  

The Captain had protested sleepily into Thor’s chest, strong arms twining closer around his neck. The squirm, the confusing complaint had been somehow sulky and seductive: so  _profoundly_ unlike the Captain. It had been quite charming, actually. As was the cookery lesson of this morning. 

His rigid embarrassment afterward had been painful to watch, though, made worse by his stubborn insistence on fully explaining why and how he felt he had done wrong. Thor had restrained himself, fearing he seemed cold. Yet the fear was outweighed by the certainty that the Captain would simply retreat in quiet horror if Thor betrayed too much emotion. Once he had begun speaking in earnest of his beloved, though, the Captain had relaxed, looking nearly as at home as he was on the battlefield, as he did not appear to be anywhere else. 

Perhaps Thor should have been more forthcoming, more animated from the start. He could have told stories of caring for a heroically drunk Fandral with Volstagg, only to find the man insistent on being bedded by them both before he would be willing to actually  _stay_ in the bed. He had relented only after Thor sat on him.  Or he could have explained how many times he himself had woken up in far stranger circumstances, especially in his youth.  He would have been pleased to be put to bed by a warrior such as the Captain.

Perhaps that would have wiser, but the Captain obviously took refuge in his decorum, held onto it as firmly as he did his shield. It would be a difficult balance to strike when they spoke again. Jane might have advice. 

Thor needed to go see her: they had left much unsaid and he had not even seen her during his last visit to Midgard. His duty had taken precedence, as it must. He had known she was safe: that was all he could do when he was needed to capture Loki, to unravel his mad plans. Perhaps that was why he had not hurried to her upon this return, despite her beauty, her bravery, her goodness. They must speak as equals and decide how they would progress.  

Barnes and his Captain had been parted by their duty, but they had borne the weight of it together, had chased each other into battle. Had left stories that were a comfort when one of them was gone.

A drawing of himself wielding a frying pan with Mjölnir’s haft caught his eye. He drummed his fingers on the instructions, then smiled. The steps were written in a precise hand. The accompanying drawings showed a wry humor that the Captain had not previously revealed.  

The wit had flavored his tales, too, but its subtlety required close watch: curiously, the man never paused after making what  _must_ have been a joke. Even Stark paused for laughter after what passed for witticisms in Midgard and the man spoke with  _incredible_ speed. Had the Captain been jesting with no-one among their company taking notice? 

What would the rest of their band think if they knew what the Captain hid? A deep sadness, an artist’s eye, a surprisingly provocative murmur? But the Captain did not want to be known, was afraid to risk it: that much was obvious. He confined his fierce devotion to ideals, to things that could not age and die.

Perhaps he could be convinced otherwise. 

**Author's Note:**

> If you enjoyed this fic, consider [reblogging it on Tumblr!](https://tolarianfic.tumblr.com/post/180427659804/whosoever-holds-this-frying-pan)
> 
> Content Notes:  
> \- Thor's kitchen has been slightly damaged by a small toaster fire  
> \- Steve feels very guilty for drinking to excess and his resulting behavior  
> \- This behavior included making a sexually charged comment at Thor while he was carrying Steve to bed; Steve also snuggled Thor a little without asking first  
> \- Thor found this behavior charming but is aware that Steve is horribly embarrassed; Steve thinks of it as a form of sexual harassment of a team-mate and is very upset at himself  
> \- Steve inwardly refers to having blacked out the previous evening; he may not be describing it accurately but he does have have some gaps in his memory from drinking to excess  
> \- Steve inwardly invokes a period-typical stereotype about the Irish being given to drunkenness  
> \- Steve refers to Bucky's death, for which he still blames himself  
> \- Steve inwardly refers to being beaten for being suspected to be queer and anticipates homophobia from Thor  
> \- Steve begins to panic, experiencing some derealization; it's not a full flashback, but he's viscerally reminded of Bucky's fall and his own time in the ice  
> \- Steve inwardly refers to killing Nazis  
> \- Steve inwardly refers to Peggy's Alzheimer's and the polyamorous relationship she had with Bucky and Steve during the war  
> \- Steve refers to Bucky being attacked by a dog  
> \- After Steve leaves, Thor remembers crying when Steve told him about Sarah's death and Bucky's invitation  
> \- Steve draws a cartoon of Thor's beard on fire  
> \- Thor remembers trying to help Volstagg get a sexually aggressive, inebriated Fandral to bed (to sleep); no sexual contact occurred
> 
> This story is part of the [LLF Comment Project](https://longlivefeedback.tumblr.com/llfcommentproject), which was created to improve communication between readers and authors. This author invites and appreciates feedback, including:
> 
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